Dogs and the word walk

A DOG who just heard its owner say the word ‘walk’ appears to have snorted a mountain of high-quality cocaine.

After accidentally saying ‘walk’ within earshot of his five-year-old Labrador, Bruce, James Bates was distraught to see the dog excitedly start bounding around the house, causing a trail of destruction.

As Bruce cannoned into a side-table, Bates said: “As every owner of a large, energetic dog knows, my existence is an incessant living hell.

“I was just innocently asking Alexa to play ‘Walk This Way’, and before I knew it, there was a five-stone beast hurtling about the house like a coked-up Charlie Sheen.”

Bruce said: “I can’t help it. As soon as I think I’m going on an amazing, exciting walk it’s like I’ve taken a massive hit from a crack-pipe and I start bouncing off the walls. The walk never lives up to expectations, but I’m a dog so I can’t make rational predictions about the future.

“Even if I hear you say something that sounds like ‘walk’ I go off my nut. The other day James was talking to his wife about the actor Christopher Walken, and I had to hurl myself around the living room and almost break the TV.”

Bates’ wife Lauren said: “When this gacked-up hound eventually dies, we’re getting a cat who doesn’t turn into Scarface at the end of the movie.”

MOST neighbours are a bit strange, but some are absolutely crackers. Here are the surefire signs the folks next door have lost their tiny minds.

Getting CCTV

If one Amazon parcel in 1,000 doesn’t arrive it’s clearly been stolen off their doorstep. Likewise, a dent in a car door 15 doors down is plague of mindless vandalism. So your neighbours will fit more CCTVs on their crap semi than Fort Knox. Paranoid? Yep, the twats are convinced ‘fish thieves’ are targeting the unremarkable goldfish in their pond.

A flagpole 

The Jubilee flushed out lots of flag-shagging neighbours. A massive Union Jack on a full-size flagpole is the properly mad option. But now there’s also the Ukrainian flag. Is it genuine sympathy or do they just like the idea of killing Russians? You suspect the latter. Probably Zelensky would prefer £500 towards missiles instead of a cheap Chinese flag erected 1500 miles away, but your neighbours are only committed to the tune of £8.99.

Chickens

A few repeats of The Good Life and suddenly everyone thinks they can run their own smallholding. It starts with a few chickens. ‘Think of the money we’ll save on eggs!’ they say, forgetting eggs cost f**k all. If they go full loony, soon the garden will be a mudbath with two farting, belching pigs. A month later the RSPCA will be trying to a rehome an alpaca they bought online whilst pissed.

A dramatic paint job

Ranking even weirder than starting a paranoid neighbourhood WhatsApp group and putting a creepy old rocking horse in their bay window comes a crazy repaint of the house. Turning your entire property a luminous pink hue will be bad for house prices, but it may also encourage other neighbours. Before long you’ll be living in a street that looks as if it’s been smeared with kids’ slime and dog vomit.

A hot tub

Every terraced house in a bad postcode needs a leaky, second-hand hot tub. Initially your neighbours will have a few weeks of raucous parties with dreadful dance music and Strongbow Dark Fruits. Then the novelty will wear off and they’ll realise how much it costs to run, and leave it to become a glorified stagnant pond. Although it’s still popular with clouds of midges, who will visit your garden too.